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In 2009, Mingming Chen, a Chinese national living in Jackson Township, applied for political asylum based on a claim that she was a member of the Falun Gong, a persecuted religious group.

Falun Gong is a relatively new faith that combines ancient Chinese folk religion and medicine and Buddhist tenets with Qigong, a series of exercises designed to heal and harness energy.

But Tianlun Jiang, a Falun Gong practitioner who lives in Cleveland, has serious doubts about Chen's claim amid allegations Chen killed her young daughter last week and falsely claimed the child had disappeared from their Jackson Township restaurant, Ang's Asian Cuisine on Portage Street NW.

"Falun Gong teaches people to be truthful, compassionate and tolerant," Jiang said. "It teaches people to be good, not lie. It teaches you to be kind to everyone, and of course, that would include your daughter."

Jiang said the Falun Gong community in Northeast Ohio is such that if Chen was a practitioner, someone would recognize her.

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"I don't know her," Jiang said. "She didn't approach any of us. We didn't know she applied (for asylum); nobody knows her. Also, we generally practice together regularly. Nobody knows her in the greater Cleveland area, or even in Ohio. I've talked to many people in Ohio. Nobody knows her."

Jiang added that members seeking asylum usually try to secure letters of support from a Falun Gong association.

"Many Chinese use Falun Gong as an excuse to secure asylum," he said. "If she applied in 2009, she probably would have only been here within 10 years. I've lived here (Cleveland) more than 10 years, I've never seen her. I asked someone who's lived here 20 years; they've never seen her."

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Jiang said that based on all he's read about the incident, Chen does not fit the profile of someone who practices Falun Gong.

"Falun Gong teaches us to be kind and to be truthful. Even if somebody is beating us, we try to find the fault within ourselves, not fight back or curse somebody," he said. "From what I read, her behavior is different."

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“Until one has loved an animal, a part of one’s soul remains unawakened.” ~ Anatole France

WATCH LIVE: Hearing held for parents accused of murdering their 5-year-old daughter

Thursday, January 19th 2017, 7:45 am PST

CANTON, OH (WOIO) - A hearing will be held Thursday morning for Ming Ming Chen and Liang Zhao, the parents [Only registered and activated users can see links. ] murdering their 5-year-old daughter Ashley and then hiding her body at their family's restaurant in North Canton.

Ashley was found dead and "concealed" on Jan. 10 at the restaurant on Portage Avenue. Her mother [Only registered and activated users can see links. ] for murder and her father was arrested for complicity.

Authorities said Chen struck Ashley several times in the head with her right first before reporting her missing Monday evening. They say Zhao then found Ashley and noticed green fluid coming out of her mouth. He took her to the bathroom to wash it off her face before attempting CPR after noticing she wasn't breathing.

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Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies... By Andy Dufresne/Shawshank Redemption

Massillon Judge C. Roland Centrone said the court hearing in the #AshleyZhao case will take place but be delayed. Unknown how long

Jessica Dill Verified account ‏@JessicaLynnDill 7m7 minutes ago
Waiting for parents of Ashley Zhao in court. Father fell getting out of the car in shackles. He is at hospital but said to be okay @fox8news

“Until one has loved an animal, a part of one’s soul remains unawakened.” ~ Anatole France

Massillon Judge C. Roland Centrone said the court hearing in the #AshleyZhao case will take place but be delayed. Unknown how long

Jessica Dill Verified account ‏@JessicaLynnDill 7m7 minutes ago
Waiting for parents of Ashley Zhao in court. Father fell getting out of the car in shackles. He is at hospital but said to be okay @fox8news

Thanks for update, ugh, how convenient, hate myself for saying that, but couldn't help it!

Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies... By Andy Dufresne/Shawshank Redemption

The parents charged in connection to the death of their 5-year-old child this month both waived their rights to a preliminary hearing Jan. 19 and both cases have been bound over to the Stark County Grand Jury.

The grand jury will decide what the final charges are, if any, against Ming Ming Chen and Liang Zhao. Chen is charged with murder and Zhao is charged with complicity to murder.

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Chen and Zhao also have a 6-year-old daughter, who is in protective custody with Stark County Children and Family Services.

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“Until one has loved an animal, a part of one’s soul remains unawakened.” ~ Anatole France

JACKSON TWP. The lights inside Ang's Asian Cuisine remained on last week.

Menus were stacked neatly on the counter. Tables were set with bottles of soy sauce and salt-and-pepper shakers. The tip jar waited expectantly on the counter.

Nothing inside the restaurant hinted that it had closed a week earlier, after police found the body of 5-year-old Ashley Zhao, the owners' daughter, hidden inside.

Liang J. Zhao, 34, and Mingming Chen, 29, reported their daughter missing Jan. 9, prompting an overnight search by Jackson Township police that ended with the discovery of Ashley's body and the arrest of her parents the following day.

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The family's neighbors, customers and the wider community have struggled to reconcile those allegations with the hardworking entrepreneurs and parents Zhao and Chen appeared to be.

"They looked so nice," said Kirk Klusty, who lived in the same apartment building as Zhao, Chen and their daughters. "They seemed like good people."

Zhao and Chen ran a popular restaurant with loyal customers, but it's hard to find anyone who knew them well.

The Canton Repository reached out to relatives of Zhao and Chen by phone, in person and on social media. No one was willing to talk.

Lawyers for the two said they still were gathering information about the case and declined to discuss details about their clients other than to confirm that they were married.

Still, details can be culled from court proceedings, old news accounts and business filings.

Zhao is a naturalized citizen who has spent about 20 years in the United States, according to news accounts. Some of that time was spent in New York. On his Facebook profile, Zhao listed Queens as his hometown.

It's unclear when Zhao came to Ohio, but according to a 2011 Repository story, he and his father had run a Chinese restaurant in Jackson Township since about 2000.

Chen's backstory is spelled out in more detail in federal court documents, but U.S. immigration officials have cast doubt on the truthfulness of her tale.

Chen applied for asylum in the United States in early 2009. She said she was a former elementary school teacher who faced persecution in China because she practiced Falun Gong, a faith that blends traditional Chinese religion and medicine with Buddhist tenets and exercise.

Chen told immigration officials she left China in August 2008 and paid a "snakehead" - a human smuggler - $68,000 to sneak her into the United States.

About two months after flying from China to Mexico, Chen crossed the U.S. border hidden inside a vehicle. Someone then drove her to New York, where she met an uncle who brought her to Ohio.

Chen told U.S. immigration authorities that she left China after police arrested her for practicing Falun Gong. (Members of the northeast Ohio Falun Gong community have said they didn't know Chen and questioned whether she really has practiced the faith.)

Chen said she turned to Falun Gong to cope with insomnia caused by job stress. She said police arrested her in April 2008 during a raid on her home and kept her in detention for a month. On one occasion, a female police officer hit Chen in the back with a baton and pushed her into a wall. The officer ordered Chen to sign a statement promising not to practice Falun Gong.

Chen initially refused to sign the paper, but after a month in custody, and pleas from her mother, she signed the statement and was released. She had been fired from her teaching job and couldn't find other work. The police told Chen they would jail her permanently if they caught her practicing Falun Gong again.

U.S. immigration authorities denied Chen's application for asylum. They said her account was not credible because of inconsistencies in her story. A judge ordered Chen's removal from the U.S. in late 2009, but she kept making appeals until at least 2012, when the U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals declined to review her case.

Chen built a family while she pursued appeals. She married Zhao in March 2010 and gave birth to a daughter in October of that year in New York City, according to federal and local court records and sources close to the case.

Zhao and Chen met while she was working for his sister's restaurant in New York state, according to an Aug. 20 article published on the Our Town North Canton website. Zhao happened to be helping at his sister's restaurant after her delivery driver had an accident.

By the summer of 2011, Zhao was back in Stark County, where he opened Ang's Asian Cuisine in the Gander Mountain plaza at 4924 Portage Street NW. He and his father had run a Lucky Star restaurant in the same plaza for 11 years, but the new name in a new storefront would differentiate Ang's from the Lucky Star eateries run by his uncles, Zhao told the Repository at the time.

In December 2011, Chen and Zhao had a second child, Ashley, who was born in Brooklyn, N.Y.

Running the restaurant was a challenge. Regular customers recalled that Zhao and Chen were the only employees in a business open six days a week. Several times during the past three years, Zhao announced on Facebook that Ang's would be closed because his wife, one of the girls or he was ill

Nina Amen said her daughter befriended Ashley's older sister in preschool last year. Zhao and Chen couldn't get away from the restaurant for play dates, so Amen would bring her daughter to the restaurant.

The family was private, and Chen, who requires a translator in court, didn't talk a lot. Zhao seemed to be a loving father, and his daughters were "daddy's girls," Amen said.

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Ashley and her sister were often in the restaurant, coloring or playing on a tablet.

The girls "were very polite, very inquisitive," said Jackie Havens, another customer from Jackson Township. "They knew how to interact with people."

DeCoy said she used to think of how bored the girls were and how tough it must be to run a restaurant while raising a family. The last time she was at Ang's was the week before Christmas; she placed her order and took a seat. Ashley came up to her. They talked about Santa Claus.

"She was very bubbly, very talkative," DeCoy said.

Zhao, Chen and the girls lived a mile from the restaurant in the Maple Wayview apartments at 7300 Sunset Strip Ave. NW.

The family rented apartment No. 11, on the top floor of a building next to Interstate 77, without much soundproofing.

Kirk Klusty said he moved into the apartment across the hall from Zhao and Chen a little more than a month before Ashley died. He estimated he saw the family a half-dozen times in passing.

"I don't think I ever caught them at a bad moment," he said.

Alex Klatt lives downstairs in No. 1. He crossed paths with Zhao and Chen three or four times a week because they tended to come home around 10 p.m., the same time he did.

"They were always polite but reserved," Klatt said.

The events and family dynamics that led to Ashley's death eventually will come out in court. Meanwhile, Zhao and Chen remain jailed in lieu of $5 million bond, and their surviving daughter is in the custody of the county child-welfare agency.

Ashley's remains have been cremated and turned over to relatives from New York.

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“Until one has loved an animal, a part of one’s soul remains unawakened.” ~ Anatole France

It’s been two months since the body of 5-year-old Ashley Zhao was found dead and her body was hidden inside her parent’s Asian cuisine restaurant.

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What actually happened to Ashley remains a mystery. Where was she killed and how was she concealed inside the family's restaurant? Where was Zhao's body found and what had the parents allegedly done to her?

Cleveland 19’s investigative team went looking for answers the day after her body was found, specifically requesting the preliminary autopsy report from the Stark County Coroner’s Office. The public records are to be made available to journalists, per Ohio Revised Code, for inspection upon request. The Stark County Coroner’s Office denied having a preliminary autopsy report and stated that even if they did, it would not be released to the media because it was part of a homicide investigation.

Cleveland 19 called upon the Stark County Prosecutor’s Office to help with the release the public record and was told by a prosecutor “I want to try the case in the county I sleep” releasing such records to the media for public consumption would make it “hard to seat a jury.”

Zhao’s body was flown back to New York for funeral services and her 7-year-old sister remains in the custody of Stark County Children and Family Services.

It’s been two months since little Ashley Zhao’s death and the events leading up to the discovery of her body remain a mystery with information purposely withheld from the media and the public during the homicide investigation.

Mingming Chen and Liang Zhao will be arraigned on charges on Wednesday, March 15 at 2 p.m. in the Stark County Court of Common Pleas.

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“Until one has loved an animal, a part of one’s soul remains unawakened.” ~ Anatole France

The indictment against MingMing Chen and Liang Zhao was released Tuesday.

March 7, 2017

CANTON A county grand jury has indicted a Jackson Township couple on murder and other charges stemming from the death of their 5-year-old daughter who was falsely reported as missing in January.

The six-count indictment against Mingming Chen, 29, and Liang Zhao, 34, both of 7300 Sunset Strip Ave. NW, was released Tuesday by Stark County Prosecutor John Ferrero's office.

Jackson Township police allege Chen punched her daughter, Ashley, several times in the head, and that when Zhao found the child on the floor, he tried to clean her up before unsuccessfully attempting CPR. Police say the couple concealed the body somewhere inside their restaurant, Ang's Asian Cuisine restaurant at 4924 Portage St. NW, before falsely reporting the girl as missing.

It prompted a large-scale search of the area on Jan. 9. Police later found the body inside the restaurant and charged the parents.

In addition to the murder charges, both parents face additional charges of endangering children (two counts), tampering with evidence, obstructing justice and gross abuse of a corpse.

If convicted of all charges, both defendants face roughly 30 years to life in prison, Ferrero said. Under state law and based on evidence in the case, the prosecutor said the death penalty does not apply.

"Anytime you have a child victim, everybody takes it very personally (as well as) the whole community, not just my office," he said Tuesday evening. "And we saw the outpouring (from the community when) the child was reported missing."

Added Ferrero, "It's something that ... strikes a nerve because it's a child."

Ferrero declined to discuss details of the investigation, including what led to the child's death and where the body was found inside the restaurant.

The indictment says that Chen and Zhao "either acting as the principal offender or aiding and abetting another, did abuse Ashley Zhao." Court records also say that Chen and Zhao caused the death of the child "as a proximate result of ... committing or attempting to commit endangering children."

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“Until one has loved an animal, a part of one’s soul remains unawakened.” ~ Anatole France

The parents of 5-year-old Ashley Zhao both pleaded not guilty to murder in the child's death at a court hearing on Wednesday in Stark County Common Pleas Court.

By [Only registered and activated users can see links. ]

CANTON - The parents charged with murder in the death of their 5-year-old daughter both pleaded not guilty Wednesday in Stark County Common Pleas Court.

Liang Zhao and Mingming Chen appeared before Judge Chryssa Hartnett for an arraignment on the murder count and several other charges. Arraignments typically take place at a designated time for large groups of individual defendants in common pleas court through a video feed from the Stark County Jail.

But a separate arraignment was scheduled for Chen and Zhao apparently because Chen does not speak English and requires an interpreter during court hearings.

A pretrial was scheduled for April 20 for both Chen and Zhao but it will be a meeting between the attorneys and judge and not in open court.

Jackson Township police allege Chen punched her daughter, Ashley Zhao, several times in the head, and that when Zhao found the child on the floor, he tried to clean her up before unsuccessfully attempting CPR.